


Fine Time for Heroics

by todisturbtheuniverse



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angst, F/M, Fluff, Humor, Pre-Relationship, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-01
Updated: 2015-10-20
Packaged: 2018-02-27 19:23:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 7,477
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2703647
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/todisturbtheuniverse/pseuds/todisturbtheuniverse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She's not particularly graceful, the Herald of Andraste.</p><p>Ficlets featuring Rhian Trevelyan, all hail the Herald of Snark and Untimely Flirting, and her initial acquaintance and friendship with Cullen.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. You can look (but mind the distance).

She's not particularly graceful, the Herald of Andraste.

Cullen has seen her fight in the practice yard, so he knows her worth on the battlefield. Her sword is nearly as big as her; she wields it like it weighs nothing. Presented with ice and snow, though, she seems less than comfortable. Every step she takes across the frozen lake is careful, slow. Even at a distance, she looks on the verge of losing her balance at any second.

Where is she from, again? The Free Marches? No wonder. Not much snow there.

It's pleasant, really. So many of the people at Haven are happy to think she's larger than life, but this touch of her humanity is more comforting to him.

"How long has she been doing that?"

Cassandra's nose is red from the cold, her eyes narrowed into the wind. She scrutinizes the Herald's—Trevelyan's—steps. She has reached her next stop along the ridge of the lake; she bends to chip something away from the stone.

"Half an hour, at least," Cullen replies. "Threnn told her we needed supplies for better weapons."

Cassandra snorts—not an unkind sound, but a disbelieving one. "So she went to find them herself?"

"It seems that way."

Cassandra is looking at _him_ , now, one eyebrow just slightly lifted, the subtle expression that means she thinks she knows something. She probably _does_ know something. She always seems to know more than him, at the very least.

"Her enthusiasm is admirable," Cassandra says at last. "I am not sure I would be so willing, were I in her place."

Trevelyan's gloved hands tuck her finds away in the pocket of her coat, and she half-walks, half-slides another few feet forward. Before she can reach the next iron deposit, though, her feet go out from under her and she lands—with an audible _thump_ —on the ice. Cullen can hear her distant laughter, as though the lake has played an amusing prank and she is congratulating it on its success.

"Her sense of humor is beyond me," Cassandra says, shaking her head as she turns away.

Trevelyan gets to her feet, rubbing her backside with one hand and shielding her eyes with the other. He can see the bright flash of her grin when she waves to him.

He lifts a hand in return. He doubts she can see it, but he's smiling, too.


	2. Everyone needs a song!

Cullen hears her voice before he pushes into the tavern, singing along to the minstrel's tune, bolstered by the laughter and cheers of their soldiers.

" _Sera was never an agreeable girl, her tongue tells tales of rebellion—_ "

She pulls the subject of the song to her feet; Sera laughs, spits an insult that Cullen can't make heads or tails of, and skips in a circle with Trevelyan anyway, singing along. The Herald pulls more people to their feet, weaving between tables and chairs until half the tavern is dancing and singing, too. The rest are clapping, raising their mugs, and Trevelyan spins through them all, still singing—just a little off-key but sweet with enthusiasm.

Cullen hasn't seen so many grins in one place in years, let alone since the Conclave. They're cut off here in these snowy mountains, and sometimes it feels like they're just waiting for the Breach to finish what it started, but you wouldn't know it to look at these people, who toast the Herald with joy on their faces.

"Come on!" she laughs as she dances past him, catching his hand before he can protest, and then he's staggering after her while the tavern roars around them.

She's not particularly graceful here, either, hopping from foot to foot in the narrow space left to them with too many bodies packed to the rafters, but her eyes sparkle with an infectious sort of glee when he spins her in a quick circle.

" _She's a rogue and a thief and she'll tempt your fate!_ "

The tavern booms with their voices, dissolving into cheers and applause and whistles as the minstrel finishes. Trevelyan curtsies to him and he bows, automatic, like he planned it.

"Sera arrived less than a week ago," he says, because she's looking at him like she expects him to say something. "How is it that our minstrel has already composed a song about her?"

"I think Maryden has a crush," Trevelyan replies, her voice sage. "But if you're feeling left out, I'm sure I could get her to write something about you, too. She could...compare you to a lion." She eyes his pauldrons.

Cullen clears his throat, unsure whether he should take offense. "I don't think that would be a particularly entertaining song."

" _Au contraire_." She smirks. " _I_ think it would be fascinating."

He opens his mouth, presumably to say something, but no words come out, and there aren't any left in his head, either. Maker, she makes him feel like a teenager, like she's always one step ahead with all the jokes in her arsenal and he'll never catch up, and it's not as if he  _should_ , anyway. She means nothing by it. He's sure of that.

She laughs—not cruelly, but just as though she's been holding it in too long. "Maker, your  _face_ ," she chuckles. "I shouldn't tease you. Are you all right? Do you need a drink?"

"I'm fine, thank you, just— _don't_ let Maryden write a song about me."

"What about after you've won us a battle or two? It would be  _very_ inspiring." She winks.

Sera chooses that moment to push through the crowd and slide her arm through Trevelyan's, grin plastered on her face. "Not so bad, your Inquisition," she tells the Herald.

"Surprising, isn't it?" Trevelyan replies, still looking at Cullen, and then she pulls Sera away toward the table with their drinks, where Varric is laughing and The Iron Bull is gesturing as though describing...something. Cullen turns away before either can catch his eye. He had some purpose here, but he's long since forgotten it.


	3. Faith is for children; I'm a woman grown.

It's worse at night, when everyone else has retreated to their beds and only he remains at the war table, his candle burning down to nothing.

The absence of lyrium gnaws at the back of his mind. There's a cavern so big and empty inside his chest that he can hardly believe it doesn't collapse. When he's fighting, going through reports, looking over supplies, he barely notices it. With the air growing colder around him, though, the hunger increases until it's the only thing he hears.

There's a creak from the front of the chantry, slipping in through the cracked door of the war room. The craving pauses. Cullen reaches for the sword laid bare on the table, listening, but the footsteps outside are soft and uncertain—not a threat, he thinks. He moves around the table to glance through the crack in the door.

It's the Herald, sitting amidst the candles, staring up at the statue of Andraste. After a long moment of looking, she bows her head, burying her face in her hands.

"You shouldn't have picked me," she says, her voice wet. "If that's even what really happened."

She takes a long, shuddering breath.

"It mustn't have been you," she goes on. Cullen feels like the eavesdropper he is, but he hovers near the door just the same, straining to hear every word. "Even you would know better. I'm no Herald, damn it. I'm a stupid noble with a sword. I'm not even sure I _believe_ in you. Or any of this."

He should announce himself. Offer reassurance. Funny that he hasn't stopped to think how awful this must be for her. The hopes and dreams and futures of all these people, whether they believe it or not, are on her shoulders. It must be so heavy a weight—

But she gets to her feet, wiping her sleeve across her eyes. "Fuck you," she spits at the statue. He sees her fingers tremble just before they form into fists. "If you're real then this is some sick joke. I won't do this for you."

She leaves as quietly as she arrived, but every step is swift and certain, now.

He expects they'll find her cabin empty in the morning, but he doesn't go after her. His legs have, in fact, ceased to obey any of his commands. He listens for hoofbeats well past midnight, but never hears a sound.

Her smirk is right where it always is when she arrives at the war table the next morning. If she notices his covert glances, she ignores them.


	4. A rusted sword, a glaring eye—

"I wouldn't have gotten it for you if I thought you would actually ride it."

"Why would I ask you to get it if I _wasn't_ going to ride it? What a waste of your resources. I'm not _that_ rude."

Cullen eyes the bog...unicorn...and it stares right back at him, tossing its mane of fiery hair. "I don't think it's safe, Herald."

"Pfft. _Safe._ Have you looked at the sky recently?" She eases her hand over the fence, palm cupped, for the bog unicorn to inspect. It takes a step closer, nostrils snuffling. Cullen stamps down the desire to drag her bodily away from the fence. At least she's not offering the beast the hand with the mark.

"There's standard danger, and then there's _unnecessary_ danger," he asserts. He glances to the right, trying to catch Dennet's eye, but the horsemaster shakes his head. The Iron Bull doesn't offer backup, either—in fact, he's wearing a very small smile.

The beast neighs—a truly awful, diseased version of the sound—and snuffles against Trevelyan's palm. Her face splits into a smile.

"You're just a big softy, aren't you? Bet you'll be something fierce in battle, though. I like your sword."

It snuffles again, moving closer. Cullen's fingers tighten on the hilt of his sword, but all the thing does is lip at the end of her braid, pulling a laugh from her. It seems to be making some effort not to cut her with the sword through its face while it does so.

The sword through its face. _Maker_.

"I'll just take him out for a ride," she declares, jumping the fence. "So we can get better acquainted."

Scowling, Cullen turns toward the stables. "I'm going with you."

"What, you think he's just waiting till your back is turned to gut me?" She chuckles, stroking the unicorn's mane. "I'm not sure how to tell you this, Commander, but I don't think your glares are enough to keep him in check, if he _really_ wanted to do me harm. You're very fearsome, it's true, but I think he's a bit _more_."

The beast neighs again.

He can salvage this. He can. He clears his throat. "No one rides out of sight of Haven alone," he says, using the stern tone he used to pull out for templar recruits. "Especially not the Herald. Bog unicorn or no, _someone_ is coming with you, and since I have nothing to attend to in the next hour, it might as well be me. Unless you object to my company."

She adjusts the saddle on the thing's back and peeks up at him. "Perish the thought, Commander." Her mouth twists into a now-familiar smirk. _Andraste_ , he thinks, eyes rolling skyward. _Why did your Herald have to be **so** mischievous? She could have been well-behaved, or **shy** , even—_

The Iron Bull lets out a roar of laughter and then, before Cullen can shout at her to _stop_ , Trevelyan swings into the saddle and spurs her mount forward. It leaps the fence with ease and takes off, at a gallop, down the path toward the pass.

"Maker," Cullen mutters. "Dennet, I need a horse. _Not_ the hart."

The horsemaster snorts, opening the gate of the first stall. "You've got your hands full with that one. Like a trebuchet, she is."

Cullen takes the reins of the Forder and pulls himself into the saddle. " _Don't_ tell her that."

Dennet waves him off. Cullen nudges his mount forward and follows the hoofprints. Cassandra raises her eyebrows as he passes; if he's not mistaken, she's fighting a smile. She goes back to beating the stuffing out of a practice dummy as though to hide it.

Trevelyan hasn't gone far; she's waiting at the fork in the path, her mount pacing back and forth. She, too, looks as though she's struggling to keep a straight face.

"You look like a thundercloud," she calls out. "Please don't be cross. They could all use a laugh."

He sighs, stopping the Forder beside her. "You're not wrong. I just don't see why it has to be at _my_ expense."

She shrugs. "Yesterday it was Leliana. Last week it was Josephine. Life goes on, even when there's a hole in the sky."

He glances up. The eerie green abyss is harder to see in full daylight, but it's there, a blemish among the clouds. "I suppose it does," he relents.

Her boot nudges his foot. "Let's race. I want to see what he can do."

He wonders if she's referring to her mount or to him, but he doesn't ask—just kicks the Forder forward when she shouts. By the time they return to the stables, the cold mountain wind has burned a deep flush into her olive skin, and his face hurts from smiling too much.

She leaves for the Hinterlands the next morning astride the bog unicorn. He doesn't worry so much when he bids her farewell, even if the beast _does_ nip at his pauldrons on its way past.


	5. Can a shield catch the sun?

"Raise your shield," Cullen tells the hundredth recruit for what must be the thousandth time. "It does you more harm than good if it's on your arm but you aren't using it."

The recruit raises the shield. Cullen can see what it costs him; no doubt he was a farm hand before this, used to a different type of work entirely, and having a heavy slab of wood and metal hanging on his arm for the better part of a day is wearing.

But he cannot afford to go easy on them. _They_ cannot afford to go easy on themselves. It will be they that die, if he fails.

"Commander," a voice calls through the clatter of blade on shield. A few pause as she passes, fists thumping to chests. "Perhaps a demonstration is in order?"

Trevelyan smiles at him, pulling her sword from her back, and his lip twitches in response before he can prevent it. She was expected to return from the Hinterlands today, he remembers, and she certainly looks as if it's been a hard day's ride: sun burned into her cheeks, hair pulling loose from her braid.

He nods to her. The recruit scurries away, as though afraid he will be caught in the middle. "Watch," he orders, raising his voice, and the drills stop for the recruits to gather eagerly around them.

He looks back to her. She stands ready, an uncharacteristically neutral look on her face—save the tiniest crook at the corner of her mouth.

"Someone with a good enough shield arm can stop someone like our Herald," he says at last, shaking his shield from his back.

"Even though my sword _is_ bigger," she jokes, and the recruits laugh.

 _She's so_ good _at this_ , he thinks. She bolsters the confidence of every one of them just by making a joke, by sharing a smile.

They circle. The small crowd watches; Cullen can feel their collectively held breath. Despite the sword—it may not be much heavier than his, but it _is_ unwieldy—she's light on her feet, quick to move. When she steps forward, she does so deliberately, her shoulders and arms heaving her strike through. It's as heavy as promised, landing on his shield like thunder, but her strike is blocked. She steps to his flank, sword arcing above her head.

He catches this blow on his sword, and swings his shield around before she can step away. She staggers back at the force of the blow but doesn't overbalance, remaining on her feet. There are a few gasps and strangled cheers and a single dry chuckle.

The fight flows forward: one of her blows knocks him down to one knee, one of his puts her on her back in the snow. They recover, circle, strike again. She knows her weapon well, and her eyes are keen. He understands the influx of new recruits, now, the ones she sent ahead from the Hinterlands, the odds and ends she saved from bandits and red templars and rogue mages. They saw her fight, and decided they would rather be behind her than in front. His bones ache from her assault, and he thinks, a little wryly, that _he_ would rather, too.

He gets a real opening at last when she is off-balance from the last swing of his shield; he knocks her to the ground and puts his sword at her throat before she can recover. Her eyes catch on his, turned up at the corners with her grin, and she says, "I yield." There's sweat in her hair and a breathless note in her voice.

It's, ah—it suits her.

He sheathes his sword and reaches down to offer her a hand up; she takes it, lets him haul her, gloved fingers clenched tight around his.

"Now," she says, her eyes turning to the recruits, "work hard at your drills and you, too, can best the Herald of Andraste someday, hmm?"

They laugh, disperse, and she lets his hand go. "Hi," she says, voice returning to normal volume. "How has Haven been with me away? Utterly peaceful, I'd imagine."

He clears his throat, smiles down at her. "Desperately boring, really."

Her eyes dance. "Well, I'm here a few days. Rematch tomorrow?" She winks.

A throat clears beside them; they both turn. He doesn't think he's ever seen Cassandra's eyebrows that close to her hairline, which can't bode well.

"Cassandra!" Trevelyan greets cheerfully. "Good match, wasn't it? I suppose you want a go, too?"

Cullen turns his face to hide the incriminating smile unfurling there; it's harder to hide the choked laughter in his throat. Cassandra, for her part, doesn't even blink.

"I would rather not," she says. "We have issues to see to, Herald."

"Indeed," Trevelyan agrees, the word made gusty by her sigh. "Lead the way, then, Seeker. _Tomorrow_ ," she hisses under her breath to Cullen, and then she follows Cassandra away, her hands rising to her head to tidy her braid.

He watches her go longer than he should.


	6. commander (Cullen)

He wakes at the sound of a boot, crunching in the snow.

Undoubtedly, it's only the changing guard, but he is an even lighter sleeper since he stopped taking lyrium, and it will put his mind at rest to check, just in case. He pulls on his boots, shrugs into his coat and pauldrons, and pulls back the flap of his tent.

It isn't the guard, unless the Herald has been added to the duty roster while Cullen's back was turned. She stands just at the edge of the lake, past the long line of tents, shoulders hunched into her coat. Her footprints look so small in the fresh snow.

The guards are still at their posts; he nods to them before making his way to her. Her attention seems fixed at some point on the lake. When he comes up alongside her, he sees what she's looking at: a huddle of ducks, all clustered together on the ice. The eerie green light of the Breach catches in the fractured surface of the lake, trickling into the cracks.

"This man outside Redcliffe said they needed food," she says, unprompted. "That the refugees were starving. I can't hunt worth a damn. Sera and Varric spent all day teaching me to use a bow, and I missed every shot. And they took less than an hour to haul in enough meat to last for days. I'm not even fast enough to  _chase_ the damn things."

He's never heard her sound so morose. Even when they first met, with the world coming down around their ears, she was nothing but hard determination. The Breach was killing her, and she didn't even seem afraid.

"My talents are elsewhere, as well," he offers. "Good thing it isn't just the two of us, or we'd starve."

The corner of her mouth crooks up. "You're funny," she says, like she'd laugh at his joke if she could muster the energy.

It really seems like she could use some comfort, and he's not sure he'd the ideal person to offer it, really, but he puts his hand on her shoulder, anyway. "Herald—"

"Rhian." She sighs. "That's my name, in case anyone wondered. I know we're all very fond of our titles, here, but you should listen to yourselves sometimes. 'Yes, Seeker, that's a clever idea.' 'No, Commander, I think we need a defter touch.' 'Ambassador, why is that woman so interested in playing cards with me?' Do you all even  _have_ names?"

He laughs, and she smiles, proudly, like she's accomplished something. "I hope you're exaggerating," he says, squeezing her shoulder. "There were introductions. With names. Perhaps your memory is at fault, here."

"It hardly sticks if you never use them! Maker's balls, I've nearly forgotten mine."

"Rhian," he repeats. "I'll remember."

Her eyes crinkle at the corners. "Sorry if I woke you, Cullen."

"The wind can do that much, on a night like this. Can I walk you back to your cabin?"

The words are out of his mouth before he realizes she could make a joke of them, but she doesn't. Her mouth twists a little, but she doesn't. "I thought I might walk around the lake a bit," she says. "I wouldn't mind company."

"I'd, ah, be happy to come along." He only stammers a little. Hopefully a little stammering can be forgiven.

"Stay close," she says, shrugging deeper into her scarf. "I mean, you saw me fall on my ass the other day. You should've seen the bruise. I hope your reflexes, at least, are better than mine."

She laughs at the look on his face and leads the way.


	7. Worry is a luxury, and we're awfully poor...

Cullen could understand, in a roundabout way, why she would want the assistance of the mages and not the templars.

He's not offended. Not really. She's doing the best she can, and the surest bet—it grates him to admit it—is more magic. Her mark did enough to stop them all dying with her will alone; it's likely that more magic would finish the job on the Breach. The templars are a gamble, one she isn't willing to take.

"You're angry with me." Trevelyan sounds weary when she says it, rolling her shoulders and resettling her sword. These matches have become a tradition of theirs; the recruits barely stop to watch anymore.

"I'm not,” he says automatically. “Why—"

"That last hit was _sloppy_."

Despite himself, he barks a laugh. "And that means I'm angry with you, specifically?"

"Well, _something's_ got into that mane of yours, and all our other problems are the usual ones. Disruptions on the supply lines, Roderick's continued yammering—I'm the only variable that's changed."

He swings low; she catches it and thrusts him back, follows it with a slice of her own. It clangs harmlessly from his shield.

"I think that approaching the templars would be less dangerous," he says at last.

She raises her eyebrows. "Oh. Not angry, then. You're _worried_."

He frowns back, sweeps his shield forward. She catches it on her sword and holds, boots digging into the dirt and snow, brown eyes squinted up in determination.

"About me," she adds, her voice considerably quieter.

He wrenches the shield away, slides his sword forward instead, but she deflects again.

"It's a risk," he warns. "Alexius has a very serious advantage, and you'll have a narrow window of opportunity to divest him of it."

She considers this as they trade a few more blows, lips pursed. Chapped from the mountain air. He blinks the distraction away and keeps up.

"I've had narrower," she declares at last.

The way she says it—the way she says most _anything_ —adds to the sweat around his collar and, damn her, gives her the opening she's looking for: she lands a hit that sends his sword flying and puts her blade at his throat.

"I yield," he sighs. "Be _careful_. That's all I'm saying."

She fetches his sword for him. "This probably doesn't surprise you," she says, apology in her tone, "but I've never been very good at being careful. Sorry."

"I suppose you've never lacked a witty retort, either?"

He hears her breath catch, sees her mouth pop open in a second of surprise before it melts into a genuine smile—no twist to her usual smirk. "You wouldn't like me if I wasn't witty," she replies.

"I wouldn't like you if you were dead, either," he points out, somewhat desperate to impress the gravity of this upon her.

"I'll do my best not to come back a corpse, then."

"I would appreciate it."

She laughs. The sound of it warms the winter chill, but she takes it with her when she rides for Redcliffe the next morning.


	8. red, red, red

She kneels at Andraste's feet, and she wishes desperately that her mother could be there instead.

She can't even close her eyes. She can't remember a single verse in that darkness before she sees someone—Cassandra, Varric—eyes red with lyrium, voice wrenched with disease. She can't let a syllable past her lips without remembering what she's brought into Haven, the _danger_ she's invited, the waver of her resolve.

At least half of the war council is furious with her, and she doesn't blame them. She is not certain, even now, that she made the right choice.

The door of the war room creaks. Someone shuffles his feet and clears his throat. "Herald," Cullen says. "I'm sorry—I didn't mean to intrude."

She doesn't look at him. He's _furious_ with her, of course he is. He was a templar; to let mages go unchecked is not in his nature. Before Redcliffe, they were friendly. She doubts they will ever be so again.

"I was just going," she says, getting to her feet. Stumbles, a little, her legs gone numb. "Don't trouble yourself."

If she wasn't so tired, she would try to worm her way back into his good graces, but she doesn't have any energy left. The mark pulls at her flesh, and she turns toward the Chantry's doors. His footsteps follow after her.

"I'll walk with you," he says. There's only a trace of hesitation in his words, like he meant to make it a question but decided on a statement instead.

She doesn't argue. He catches up to her side, and they go out into the still night together.

The cold bites into her exposed face, sneaks beneath her armor. It's so much worse in the dark, even without the wind. The snow crunches underfoot. She doesn't dare look at him, and she doesn't try to make conversation. There is nothing left to say. She wonders—a little miserably—who she'll flirt with now. Cullen gets the funniest stammer, this hitch in his step when she says something outrageous to him; no one else knows how to be embarrassed like he does.

And she likes him. Truly. It galls her, but it pains her that he is angry with her, that they will now just be Herald and Commander and nothing more.

The walk to her cabin is short, but it stretches too long. She wants to be away from him, away from those scalding words that follow after them from the Chantry as if given a life of their own.

She wants to cry on her mother's shoulder, too, but for once in her life, she cannot have whatever she wants. She wants to adjust gracefully, but it is harder than she imagined.

"Well," she says, when they've reached her door, "this is me." She turns to open it. It's a relief to have her back to him—no more temptation to sneak a sideways look, to see what state his face is in.

He catches her arm—bare hand tucked in the crook of her elbow. She goes still at the contact, and he pulls back too quickly, as if afraid he's offended.

"I wanted to apologize," he says. He sounds a little like he's berating himself. When she turns back to him—gets a glimpse of his face at last—his brow is creased, the hand that caught hold of her rubbing the back of his neck. "I was...too harsh, earlier. You did exactly what we asked of you. It was wrong of me to question your judgment, after that."

He meets her gaze—earnest, hopeful—and she can't think of a single thing to say. "Oh," she says, too quietly, like a placeholder for a much wittier comment.

He seems content to carry the conversation for her. "I read your report," he goes on. "I can't imagine...what you saw."

Her fingers tighten into her palms. The mark throbs beneath the pressure. "Don't," she says. "That's my advice. It's not something you want to see."

He looks at her. There's worry in the twist of his mouth. She hates herself for it, but she is glad she didn't see _him_  in that future that almost was. Bad enough to imagine him beating himself bloody against the impenetrable walls of Redcliffe. Every time _once more_ , every time a failure, until—

A sound wrenches from her throat—awful and choked and hurting, like an animal snared in a trap—and she presses shaking fingers over her mouth to stifle it. She can't believe it came from her.

One moment, she's desperately wrestling her composure into compliance, and the next, the fur of his mantle is soft on her face, his arms around her, and her hands are pressed to his breastplate and she wishes she could make herself push him away. She wishes that this wasn't how she found out she cared, actually _cared_ , with the spectre of an almost-future wearing down into her bones.

She doesn't cry. With her face screwed up in his fur and his arms around her, even then, she can't make herself—but she gets her breathing back under control, and stops shivering, and then he pulls back from her, hands resting on her shoulders.

"I'm sorry," he says again.

"You say that a _lot_ ," she tells him.

His lips twitch. "Not without reason."

There's an awkward moment when they part for the night—when she turns to watch him leave, he's rubbing the back of his neck again, the fingers of his free hand clenched reflexively around the hilt of his sword—but she carries the warmth of his touch with her into the waiting nightmares: proof irrefutable that all is not yet lost.


	9. Death has a doorstep (but He didn't want me)

"I'm cold, I'm cold, I'm cold. Maker, why does it have to be so cold."

Cullen looks up. There's a headache behind his eyes, a distraction that keeps pulling his attention from the map. Cole has not spoken since Haven, not a word since the Herald—Trevelyan—Rhian—left the Chantry with her sword bared and shoulders squared. She didn't look back, not once, and now she must be—

"Cold, cold, so cold. Bloody wind. Bloody stupid wind."

Cole isn't even in the wind; he's sheltered by the tent, sitting at Roderick's side, his head bowed and that ridiculous hat hiding most of his face. Cullen's heart beats with a helpless surge of anger—if the boy hadn't come, if the boy hadn't  _said_  what that monster wanted, she wouldn't be—

But she would be. She would have gone, anyway. For all her jokes, for all her cheer, she didn't balk when the end came. She rushed to meet it. He hadn't expected that, but he should have.

"There," Cole says, looking up, back at the path that's snowed over now. He points.

Disbelieving, Cullen looks. There's a figure wading through the snow, one laborious step at a time. Her arms are folded around her chest, her shoulders hunched into the wind.

"It can't be," Cassandra says, her eyes fixed on the figure.

Cullen is already on his feet; he is already climbing up the path before he knows he's moving, and he hears the others right behind him, breath fast with hope. The dull silence over the camp blows away like a bad dream, mutters becoming shouts, questions asked above the crackle of their fires.

She takes a last step and goes to her knees. Her teeth chatter. Her lips are split from the cold, the blood dried in the cracks. There's a spectacular bruise around her left eye.

He's never seen a more beautiful sight. He's never been so giddily, terribly happy.

"Commander," she says, her breath—alive, alive, she's  _alive_ —frosting the air. "I'm sorry I made fun of your pauldrons. Could I borrow them, please?"

Behind him, Cassandra laughs, breathless and loud with relief, but he wouldn't think of denying the request. He pulls them from his shoulders and wraps them around her. He doesn't remember when he knelt in the snow, but the cold seeps into his knees, and she sighs like she's just sunk into a warm bath.

"You've got to tell me where you got these," she says, every word slurring to the next, and then she faints.


	10. blessed are the lights in the shadow

She can't stop sleeping.

Every time she fights to get her eyes open, they close again. She catches glimpses of people who follow her back to her dreams: Mother Giselle, patting the sweat from her face; Leliana, tending the bruise around her eye; Josephine, quietly reading a book aloud; Cullen, praying and interrupting himself.

She forces herself to wake for that last one, sluggish but determined. He doesn't notice her; his face is pressed to his folded hands. He looks too small, somehow, and she frowns deeply as she tries to work out what's missing. His breastplate gleams too bright, even in the candlelight of the tent, and she realizes soon after that his mantle is still wrapped around her, despite the pile of blankets near burying her.

She opens her mouth to try and speak, but her throat aches. She extracts her arms from the blankets instead, clumsily trying to tug the fur from around her shoulders. She reaches out to touch his knee.

He starts, looks up, and he looks worse for the wear, too, hair unkempt and a healing wound cutting across his cheek. She remembers it bleeding when they parted ways in the Chantry; now it's an angry red line, closed.

"Here," she says, her voice cracked around the one syllable, still tugging at the fur stuck to her.

He reaches, not for his mantle but the pitcher of water beside the cot. He pours out a cup for her and holds it to her lips, ignoring her attempts to wrestle the fur off, and she gives up and drinks instead, the water a balm on her throat.

"How are you feeling?" he asks when she's done. He sounds nearly as wretched as her.

"Like a mountain fell on me." She shifts beneath the blankets, taking stock. Her entire left shoulder aches something fierce from where she fell on it escaping. The anchor is even worse, a solid ache in the palm of her hand, and she clenches her fingers with what little strength is left to her, covering the green glow. She can still feel Corypheus yanking at the leash, trying to divest her of her last weapon.

He reaches for her hand, no fear at all for anchors, and with care she rolls to her side to face him.

"Maker, we thought you were dead." He's still considering it, too, like she might expire from the cold and the pain yet.

She tries an old, familiar smirk. The bruise around her eye aches, but he needs to see it to be reassured. "I didn't come back a corpse," she tells him, and he huffs out an exhausted laugh. "It takes more than a few bruises to kill me."

"So I see."

She keeps her eyes open a moment longer to see his face—slack with relief, brown eyes fixed on hers--and then she closes them with a sigh.

"Did make me awfully tired, though," she says, turning her face into mantle and pillow.

His hand squeezes hers, fingers gentle. "Rest. We're in no immediate danger."

Fleetingly, she remembers Corypheus—the dragon—and thinks that can't possibly be true, but she doesn't have the energy left to fight the wave of drowsiness breaking over her. She slips back into sleep, and his prayer follows after her, a beacon in the dark.


	11. Warrior Heart

A dark banner waves on the battlements above him, and, distracted from his search of the gardens, he looks up to see her hair flapping in the breeze, undone from the braid and wildly tangled, backlit by the setting sun.

She was expected in the war room an hour ago. There'd been some irritation at her tardiness, and then a full-blown panic at her continued absence; not wishing to alarm the whole of Skyhold just yet, Leliana had gone to search the library, Josephine her quarters and the dusty rooms beneath the keep, and he, after checking the stables and the practice yard, made his way hopelessly here.

She is not even fully _well_ yet; his hands, a moment ago trembling with a fear he'd hoped he'd left behind in their trek to this isolated fortress, clench into fists. There's still a cough caught deep in her chest, something leftover from her march through the cold and snow, and there's no conceivable way she made her way to that perch without aggravating it—not to mention the barely-healed bones in her arm, still tender. There aren't _stairs_ in this part of Skyhold yet. Not intact stairs, anyway.

"Inquisitor," he calls from the shadowed garden, just short of a bark.

One shoulder hitches up, as if defending from an invisible blow, but she ignores him flat-out.

"Rhian," he tries instead, uncurling the fingers crushed to his palms.

That gets him an airy glance over her shoulder, brow cocked at an impossible angle. The dying sun paints a golden streak across one cheek. "Oh, Cullen," she says, in tones of great surprise. "Whatever are you doing down _there_?"

"I could ask you the same question." He rests a hand on his sword; the pommel, worn smooth, is friendlier to his joints, old and familiar. "If you _climbed_ , I'm afraid I'll have to tell the healers. I don't think you've been cleared for such strenuous activity yet."

She's already swiveled around to face the mountains again, so it's harder to hear her next words: "But I've been cleared for hours of mush at the war table, apparently."

It's impossible to talk to her from down here: she's clearly created a wall, and he'll have to go up or around it to work out what's going on. He looks up, frowning, at her balcony. A knotted tangle of sheets, like a makeshift rope, dangles from her rooms, and ends a short drop away from the battlements.

He goes before she can tell him to stop, moving through the keep with such a thundercloud on his face that people leave him alone. No one questions him when he tries the door beside the throne and finds it unlocked. The inner door stands open, too, testament to Josephine's attempts to locate her. He scales the stairs, spares a parting glance for her rooms—armor neatly hung, but the desk and the bed a complete mess, all the sheets stripped away to form her rope—and goes to the balcony.

She's peering down into the garden, squinting through the gathering dark. "You can't get down, can you?" he asks, the hard knot in his chest finally coming loose. If he's not careful, he'll laugh. "And you can't get back up, because your arm hurts too much."

Her head snaps up to glare at him. "I can get down whenever I like," she declares. She does _not_ claim that she can get back up, because they both know he's right about that much.

He tests the rope.

"I don't think it can handle your weight," she warns, the first spark of worry kindling in her honey-brown eyes. "You're in full armor." In a mutter that carries nonetheless, she adds, "As always."

He's fallen from worse heights climbing trees, so he risks it, sliding over the railing and down the sheets. He feels the fabric strain, but ultimately, he drops to the battlements unscathed. Lips pressed tight together, she turns away toward the mountains again.

"I understand how you evaded Josephine, now," he comments. "She claimed she'd gone all the way into your quarters, and hadn't found you, but I doubt she thought to check the balcony, because she doesn't believe anyone capable of this childishness."

Her shoulders go stiff. A muscle in her jaw clenches, and it may be his imagination but he would swear on Andraste she's grinding her teeth. "I accepted this position. I didn't accept being kept out of the field to be hemmed and hawed over like some fragile duckling while my advisors bore me to tears." She's gaining momentum like she's a sword in her hands, the frenzy of battle driving her volume up. "The three of you are good at your jobs. I'd just like to be allowed to do mine."

He moves to stand at the battlements beside her. She doesn't budge, not an inch, as still and immovable as stone.

"You will." He tries to reassure, not exasperate, though it's a thin line to walk, with her. "When you're not at risk of breaking every bone all over again."

She snorts, flings her hands in the air—the green of the anchor glimmers in the dark—and paces away from him. "I'm _fine_ ," she says. "I got down here, didn't I?"

He ignores this. "It's only another week."

She groans. "If I have to sit on my hands for another week, I'm not going to make it. I should be _out there_."

"And what happens if you go out there too early, and get killed because you weren't well enough?" It's time to needle; she will reach her boiling point eventually, and then he can work out a strategy to get her out of the cold. "There are still dozens, maybe hundreds, of rifts. Without you to close them, how much damage will be done?"

"How much damage is being done while I sit here pondering what-ifs?" she fires back. "How many people will I have to face who've lost loved ones because I didn't get there quick enough? Because my stupid body's taking its sweet time?"

Breathing heavily, she scrubs her hands over her face.

"The alternative is worse." Quietly. He knows she sees this much.

"I _know_ that, Void take you!" she shouts; he doesn't think he's ever seen her so furious. Quieter, as though startled by her own volume, "I know that." Every line in her face is pinched with misery. She coughs, rasps in a struggling breath, and coughs again, her eyes gleaming wet with the force of it, but thin mountain air be damned, she wrestles herself back under control.

After a long moment, during which he looks at her and she looks back, her jaw set, she crosses the battlements back to him, to lean against the stone at his side. With a weary sigh, she leans sideways against him, cheek tipped to his shoulder. The familiarity warms and unnerves him both; bad enough when she was a minor noble with a glint in her eyes and a glimmer on her hand, but now she has transcended even that.

He had expected—not wanted, no, but anticipated—a change, a solemnity borne of rank, but he should have known that she is determined to unbalance him.

"I don't know how I'm going to get down," she confesses, her voice rough with coughing, but at least this carries a twist of her old humor.

He puts an arm around her shoulders; it seems the thing to do, when he can feel her shivering, not stone at all but flesh and bone, safe. Infuriating, but safe. Her shoulders rise and fall beneath his arm with every hard-won breath.

"Somehow, we'll manage," he tells her, and she gives a quiet snort of disbelief at his optimism, but she doesn't make any effort to move.

For a while longer yet, neither does he.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The end of the beginning, or something like it.
> 
> If I end up writing more of these two, I'll stick it in a series tag tied to this first bit.


End file.
